Schools, Janitors Reach Accord

Building Engineers' Jobs Safe For Now

July 22, 1996|By Michael Martinez, Tribune Education Writer.

After threatening two months ago to replace 720 union building engineers, Chicago Public School officials have now reached an agreement with the union that allows principals to readily dismiss engineers who fail to keep schools clean.

Under the agreement, the building engineers running the system's 553 schools will keep their jobs, which carry an average annual salary of $48,613.

But the International Union of Operating Engineers Local 143 has made several concessions that loosen the union's tight grip on school plant operations, school officials said Friday.

Schools chief Paul Vallas threatened in May to hire another union because he said he lost patience with Local 143 about cleaning up dirty schools and disciplining poorly performing engineers. Last year, the school board eliminated the system's 500 union stationary engineers.

Under the new agreement, the school system retains the option to hire a private firm to replace the Local 143 engineers who oversee the heating, cooling, electrical and other day-to-day operations of school buildings, Vallas said.

"We have made no commitments not to privatize," Vallas said. "The objective of the agreement was that we have a partnership in running the schools. The schools are going to get cleaner, the engineering staff is going to be more responsive and they're going to open up their ranks to our graduates."

Donald McCue, president of Local 143, whose 720 members work solely in Chicago Public Schools, said he felt "very positive" about the agreement.

"It's more an understanding than an agreement," McCue said. "I would be remiss if I didn't say this gives us some job security, which we didn't have May 24."

The Board of Education, however, will privatize those building engineers who will staff the dozen or so new schools, replacement schools and annexes that are scheduled to be built over the next five years, officials said.

The union will set up an apprenticeship program in Chicago City Colleges that will train Chicago Public School graduates to become engineers and is aimed at providing racial diversity in the union, school officials said.

The school system will reduce the number of building engineers by 200 through attrition and retirement over the coming years, school officials said.